


The Morning Of

by See_Kay_Write



Series: NaNo17 [6]
Category: Madam Secretary
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Thanksgiving, so much food
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-16
Updated: 2017-11-16
Packaged: 2019-02-03 03:48:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,775
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12740406
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/See_Kay_Write/pseuds/See_Kay_Write
Summary: "Did we knock over a bakery??"Henry and Elizabeth get ready to host Thanksgiving.





	The Morning Of

**Author's Note:**

> For day 15 of my NaNo! Got a prompt you'd like to see me fill? Leave it in the comments!
> 
> No prompt on this one, just a dream I had this morning about a lot of frozen turkeys sitting around. Look, I work in food retail, to the surprise of no one, there are frozen turkeys on the brain this time of year, even though it isn't my department...

 

Henry got halfway down to the kitchen and froze on the stairs.

 

“What’s… what’s all this?” he called, taking a slow survey of the kitchen as he came down the rest of the way. 

 

“Thanksgiving?” Elizabeth poked her head out of the fridge.  In deference to her day off, her hair was brushed and pulled back in a loose ponytail, and she had on her Harvard (just kidding) sweatshirt and sweat pants.  For his part, he hadn’t even run a brush through his hair and he was still in the t-shirt and sweatpants he’d gone to bed in.  Damn he loved days off.  He didn’t let himself be distracted though.

There was absolutely no counter space left in the kitchen, and it was only 8 am.  He should have listened to the tiny voice screaming ‘bad idea!’ when they’d agreed to host thanksgiving this year.  They could have blamed it on security.  There was still time to go blame it on security and take everyone out to eat, maybe?  He filed that away as a back up plan.

 

“I uh, don’t know if you noticed, babe,” he approached her slowly, he didn’t even recognize what was in the bowl in front of her, and he wasn’t sure if he was supposed to or not, “but there are six turkeys sitting around.  …where did they all come from?  None of this was here last night.”

 

He snuck a glance at the clock again, but no, it was only 8 am, and she hadn’t gotten up that much earlier than he had.  The smallest turkey was about ten pounds, but he spied a twenty five pound one sitting in a pan next to the fridge.  He was pretty sure it hadn’t thawed at all.

 

“Well, the one that’s thawed in the gold wrapper is from your sister, that little one is from my brother, and that really big one is from congress.  I’m still trying to decide if I should be reading something into that or just let it go.  I lost the card to the one you’re standing next to but security cleared them all, so I’m sure it’s fine.   I might have mentioned around the office that we were hosting for the first time this year.”  She frowned a little and then decided that no, she wasn’t concerned by it either if they weren’t.

 

“Uh-huh,” Henry replied quietly, still trying to process.  This was not her first year in office.  They had not gotten sent turkeys out of the blue before.  He wasn’t even sure if he wanted to know what was happening right now.  “Can I just… go back up to bed and pretend this isn’t happening?”  It seemed like a reasonable suggestion to him.

 

“Nope!” Elizabeth said cheerfully, bringing another bowl out of the fridge.  Jell-O, maybe?  That he’d seen in the fridge yesterday at least.  “We need to get the turkeys we’re not going to be using donated- especially that one from congress, they have ways and means about them- haa, see what I did there? Ways and means?  Oh come on, who doesn’t like government puns?”

 

“Yep, I’m going back to bed,” Henry hid a grin as he made a turn for the stairs.  

 

Elizabeth grabbed his arm before he’d made it a step, “No no no, stay, we’ll put on aprons, it’ll be fine!” she grinned up at him.  “Besides, think about it, how much do you _really_ want me cooking this all by myself?”

Henry allowed himself to be led back over to the island and peered at the turkey his sister had so thoughtfully sent over, “I think I’m insulted for you that my dear sister sent a pre-seasoned one, but, uh, and remember that this comes from a place of love, but no, I really don’t.”

 

Elizabeth just smirked at him, “Yeah, that’s what I thought.  And, hey!  This way there can be absolutely no complaining about the way it’s seasoned then, right?”

 

“the thing I love about you is your optimism,” Henry said diplomatically.  He loved his family, he did, but..  “I’m just going to see how much room we have to work with.”  He went over to the dining room, missing the face Elizabeth made at his comment.  “Did we knock off a bakery?!”   Pumpkin pie, of course, but also apple, chocolate silk, lemon meringue, cherry, something that might be a blueberry, some sort of cheesecake, sugar cookies shaped like turkeys, chocolate chip cookies…

 

“Thanksgiving is more about the desserts,” she said serenely, starting to get the turkey out of the bag.  He came back in quickly.

 

“The table, it’s literally covered in pies and cookies,” he stared at her.  Those _definitely_ hadn’t been there when he’d gone to bed.  Maybe he was still dreaming and this would all be mysteriously dealt with when he woke up.

 

She peered at the directions on the packaging, dumped it into the pan, and set the oven for the corresponding temperature, “I think there’s a box of éclairs too in there somewhere, Blake is truly earning his bonus this year.  The pumpkin and the apple are from your brother, the cherry is from Will, Alison made the sugar cookies, Stevie found the cheesecake.  Blake improvised on the rest as well as making sure everything got here.  I promised him one éclair and a piece of the chocolate pie, he’ll be here around 3.”

 

Blake, that explained it.  Henry should really have realized sooner.  Oh man, it was actually going to happen, they really were having everyone over.  All his siblings, all the kids, Will and his family, probably at least some of her staff besides Blake at some point, all under the same roof…

 

“Babe?” she looked over at him after she closed the oven door.

 

“This is really happening,” he said quietly, “We’re really having everybody here this year.”  It wasn’t that he hadn’t realized it, he just hadn’t _realized_ it until just now.

 

“We really are!” She was so _excited_ about it, Henry half admired half dreaded.  

 

“I’m just going to check on the wine and beer,” he decided.  That would be the way to get everyone of legal age through this with no bloodshed, probably.  The kids were on their own.

 

“Check the pantry!” Elizabeth pointed.  She looked way too proud of herself.

 

He opened the door, bracing himself and still wound up staring, “Did we rob a liquor store too?  Where are you finding this kind of time in your schedule?”  He was impressed with Blake’s delivery arrangement skills.  He wished he’d given the guy less of a hard time about looking tired a couple of days ago though.

 

“Is it too early to start the potatoes?  It’s too early to start the potatoes,” she decided amongst herself, “Blake gets creative with naming my appointments, it’s fine, I’ve totally got an alibi.”  They’d been aiming for everyone over around noon and eating whenever the turkey was done.   Most of the food could definitely wait a couple hours, Henry was realizing.   Stevie already said she’d pick up Alison, Jason was still asleep, and if he had any sense, would decide retreat was the better option before entering the kitchen before anything was ready.

 

Henry really didn’t want to pop her enthusiasm for today, but, “I’m glad you’re excited about this, honey, but you’re not worried this is all just a little much?  We could have everyone over for a week and still not make a dent in the dessert table  …which we’re going to have to move if  we want to actually eat in there.”

 

Her face fell a little, which is absolutely not what he had been going for, “I know, I know, I just really want this to go perfectly.  The holidays are all different now with the kids grown, but its so nice that we managed to get everyone together this year.”

 

Henry leaned into her back and wrapped his arms around her waist, swaying gently with her, “Well, the liquor store in the pantry will probably help with that, but, you’ve met my family right?  Once or twice?  I know I’ve met yours.”

 

Elizabeth tilted her head up at him, “Lower expectations?”  she sounded both mostly amused and vaguely resigned.

 

“Just a tiny bit,” he said, holding a hand up, thumb and finger bare millimeters apart.  He leaned over for a kiss, and then pulled her back into the backwards hug for a few moments longer.   This was nice, they hadn’t had a chance to do a lot of this recently, just enjoying each other’s company.  Paint fight not withstanding.  “Let’s get some breakfast before we get to cooking?  I think I saw some of those croissants you like on the table?”

 

“Now you’re talking!” Elizabeth made a beeline for the table, and grinning, he padded after to watch her dig through the contents for the box he knew perfectly well was on top on the left.

 

Seriously though, where were they going to go with all of this stuff while they ate?

 

He put the turkeys they were going to donate back in the freezer while she got the coffee maker going, and then set to figuring out sides.  Nothing else would take anywhere as long as the turkey, but they had an impressive amount ready to go.  Green been casserole, stuffing, noodles (for Alison), potatoes ready to be mashed, corn…  they were not going to be hurting when it came to leftovers, he decided.  He hoped they had enough pans for everything.

They settled down at the counter with coffee and the croissants, Henry even managed to hide one away for whenever Jason woke up.

 

“Okay, so if the turkey needs about 4 hours to cook,” Henry guesstimated, eyeing the chart Elizabeth had printed off from somewhere on the depths of the internet.  “Then we start the potatoes around 11, the casserole around 11:30 and the vegetables sometime after that?”

 

“I do love a man that can schedule,” Elizabeth grinned.

 

“Oh so I _do_ need to be worried about Blake,” Henry mused to the ceiling.  She flicked a dishtowel at him and he laughed.

 

“That leave us with, oh, two whole hours,” he continued, ignoring the towel, “whatever will we do with that time?”

 

“Oh, I’ve got an idea or two…” Elizabeth grinned and pulled him toward the stairs.  “Wait, grab the aprons.”

 

“Not the ones we’re going to actually use to cook in later, right?” he clarified, one hand on the pantry door.

 

“Oh god no,” Elizabeth shook her head, “No, wait, they’re still upstairs.”  He let himself be pulled back over and upstairs with a grin.


End file.
